The Australian dream will not come crashing down for prospective international students — a majority of them are from Andhra Pradesh and Telangana — with the abolition of ‘Subclass 457 visa’, as it is related to employees rather than the students.
As worried parents reach out to education consultants and immigration experts to understand the dynamics of the 457 visa abolition, experts say international students who wish to look for jobs after their education fall under the 485 post-study work visa, which remains unaffected. The Indian students, particularly those from the two Telugu States, pursuing IT, Engineering and Accounting related courses aren’t affected at all with the changes.
“The current 457 sub-class visa is only being replaced by a Temporary Skilled Visa (TSS). So, we can certainly summarise that it will not impact genuine import of workers provided the occupation category is either in short, medium and long-term skill shortage list,” says Ravilochan Singh, Sydney-based consultant.
The two visas replacing the subclass 457 visa will be granted for four years for occupations falling under Medium and Long-term Strategic Skills List (MLTSSL), previously known as Skilled Occupation List (SOL), and for two years for occupations falling under Consolidated Sponsored Occupation List (CSOL), henceforth known as Shorter-term Skilled Occupation List (STSOL). This new category will come into effect starting March 2018.
Criticising the media for creating an impression that Australia has got ‘Trumped’ and the “international students” will be affected, Mr. Singh says of the 216 jobs being slashed from the eligible occupations list, 18 of those being cut haven’t been used once in the last decade. Those jobs include turf growers, deer farmers and detectives. The “more popular” such as accountants, engineers and IT workers have not been removed at all.
Nisidhar Borra, another Australia-based consultant with branches in India argues that students visa regulations remain the same. International students move to work after studies through a visa called sub-class 485 and those gaining experience and with right background will be able to move on to Permanent Residency (PR) easily.
Unlike the USA where working on H1B is must for foreigners before they hope to get a Green Card, international students in Australia never go through the subclass 457 visa as they can apply for PR straight from their subclass 485 visa that allows them to work after their studies.
However, low-skilled foreigners who are used by the companies to abuse 457 visa will get affected. Most of these come from North India with the sole intention of migration and companies exploit them paying low salaries and creating ‘fake’ pay slips. This practice will be checked now comparing the tax returns of the companies and the employees.
